


The kitsune's kiss

by Codango



Category: Natsume Yuujinchou | Natsume's Book of Friends
Genre: Aged-Up Character(s), Heartache, Kitsune, Love Confessions, Love Potion/Spell, Lovesickness, M/M, Mistaken Identity, Pining, Post-Canon, Sex Magic, Sharing a Bed, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-22
Updated: 2017-05-22
Packaged: 2018-11-03 19:40:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,308
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10974021
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Codango/pseuds/Codango
Summary: The first time Natsume saw the yokai, it took him six and a half minutes to realize it was not, in fact, Tanuma Kaname. It really shouldn’t have taken him so long. Tanuma had been in Tokyo for an entire year by that point, studying anthropology of all things. He would have had no logical reason to be at the local grocery store, staring motionless and wide-eyed at Natsume from the other side of the produce section.Natsume was a bit quicker on the uptake the second time the yokai appeared. It was at the library and watched silently as Natsume checked out a couple books on the history of small regional gods. The third time was outside the local bar Natsume had developed a liking for. Natsume barely blinked an eye.





	The kitsune's kiss

The first time Natsume saw the yokai, it took him six and a half minutes to realize it was not, in fact, Tanuma Kaname. It really shouldn’t have taken him so long. Tanuma had been in Tokyo for an entire year by that point, studying anthropology of all things. He would have had no logical reason to be at the local grocery store, staring motionless and wide-eyed at Natsume from the other side of the produce section.

Natsume was a bit quicker on the uptake the second time the yokai appeared. It was at the library and watched silently as Natsume checked out a couple books on the history of small regional gods. The third time was outside the local bar Natsume had developed a liking for. Natsume barely blinked an eye.

“You could banish it,” Nyanko-sensei admonished, glaring at the Tanuma-lookalike as Natsume went ahead and ordered a pint. “It’s not good for my heart, running across that thing with no warning.”

“It’s harmless enough.” Natsume gave an easy shrug. “Maybe it’s bored. It’ll find someone more interesting to impersonate soon.”

“You think so, do you?” But Nyanko-sensei appeared to content himself with swiping a lick of foam off of Natsume’s beer. “Well. Perhaps.”

The fourth time, Natsume’s head knew right away. It took his heart a second longer, and by then it was too late. The sight of Tanuma Kaname in his bathtub drew him up short, one hand on the bathroom doorknob, the other at his chest, a gasp falling from his open mouth. Natsume’s eyes raced over the lean shoulders, the mature throat, the long dark hair dripping slowly into the tub. His dear friend’s chest, his arms, his beautiful, beautiful hands reaching out…

“Tanuma.” Natsume barely realized he’d stepped forward. He tried to make himself stop and only succeeded in stumbling.

The yokai smiled—Tanuma’s small, sweet smile—and Natsume was clutching the edge of the bath. Slim, wet fingers carded through Natsume’s hair. Dark lashes fluttered closed, and the yokai lifted its chin, and Natsume was lost. He heard his own helpless sigh moments before his mouth met soft, cool lips that were open and ready for him.

Desperate longing exploded in Natsume’s chest, and he cradled that familiar jaw in both hands. His heart ached, it hurt, but he would never have severed the embrace on his own. “Tanuma,” he groaned against the false mouth, the want too strong to be bothered with reality. Pink fog clouded his thoughts—who was to say what was real and what was not? Maybe the hurt would go away if he deepened the kiss, held on tighter, let his skin be touched everywhere—

“Natsume!” The deep-throated roar barely registered through the blissful ache in his mind, but reality was crystal clear and shocking when something knocked Natsume roughly to the floor.

“Nyanko-sensei!” Natsume stared at his bodyguard, huge and white and snarling in his true form. Like this, he was Madara, an immensely powerful inugami, more than a match for the clever faker sitting ass-naked in a bathtub.

But clever it was. It held up a hand in the face of Madara’s jaws and shouted, “Eat me and he dies right now!” When Madara growled, threatening, the smaller yokai added, “You know it’s true.” Its smile was evil and had no place on Tanuma’s lovely face.

“Then leave,” Madara growled, backing down, “before I forget the risk and eat you regardless. Come back, and I promise I will have forgotten.”

Not-Tanuma stood from the bathtub, a smirk on its lips. Natsume stared at the floor, heat crawling up his neck. Everything else had been a perfect imitation of Tanuma. Natsume owed it to his friend to look away.

The yokai laughed, delighted. “You’re mine.” In a puff of pink smoke, it was gone, the bathtub empty and dry.

With a long-suffering sigh, Madara devolved into his comforting cat form and became Nyanko-sensei once again. “Careless brat,” he scolded, scared and affectionate and irritated all at once. “How are you?”

“I…” How was he? Natsume realized he was clutching his shirt. His chest ached. He felt empty and raw. A tear fell on his hand at his chest. “Shit,” he whispered. How long had he been crying?

“I should have known, I should have.” Nyanko-sensei waddled out the bathroom door, shaking his head. “Get out the good sake. You won’t like this.”

Natsume did not have “good” sake, but he had something that professed to be sake on its label, and that is what he and Nyanko-sensei drained to its dregs that night. The yokai who impersonated Tanuma was a kitsune, which explained how it had managed to slip past Nyanko-sensei’s protective barriers around the apartment. Crafty and powerful, they were difficult to guard against.

“This particular shapeshifter,” Nyanko-sensei slurred, “seems to favor impersonating secret lovers. The more you react to it, the greater its power over you becomes.”

Natsume was still slightly more sober than his bodyguard. “Then it should have no power over me. Tanuma and I—” He paused. “—we aren’t…we never were…well, we aren’t. So.”

“Oho, I’m glad you explained!” Nyanko-sensei sneered. “We’ll just send word to our kitsune friend that it was mistaken, then.”

Natsume glared. And oddly, felt tears welling up again. His chest really did ache. He wished it would stop.

Nyanko-sensei faltered and batted his empty sake cup between two fluffy paws. “The kitsune looks at the heart. It sees desire and fantasy and takes hold wherever it can.” He looked up. “Your desire must have been sitting at the top of your heart. I should have cautioned you the moment you first told me you saw it.”

“Why didn’t you?” Natsume whispered. He was afraid if he tried to speak at full volume his voice would crack and give him away entirely. Not that it seemed he was hiding much from the drunken cat.

“You would have appreciated that, would you?” Nyanko-sensei gestured for more sake. “A yokai telling you that your infatuation is showing and the only way to protect yourself is to confess to your lover’s face?”

“We’re not lovers!” Natsume insisted hoarsely. “…what?”

“You kissed a kitsune,” Nyanko-sensei stated. “Until you confess to the true object of your affections, it has first claim to your soul. It’s counting on the fact that you’ll keep your love secret. It’ll drain your spirit until you die.”

Natsume blinked. Then laughed. “Confess or die?” He tried to convince himself he found this horrifying situation funny. “Is the kitsune a junior-high bully?”

Nyanko-sensei smiled without humor. “They’re not known for their maturity.”

Confess to Tanuma. It wasn’t anything he’d planned on doing ever. He’d told himself he didn’t love him, not like that. He’d cried to himself in his room the night Tanuma had told him he was moving to Tokyo to study, but that was just because Natsume had grown so used to him. It was nice to have a human around who knew about Natsume’s second sight. A human who didn’t try to use him for it. A human who was warm and friendly and thoughtful, and if Natsume also thought this human had a beautiful face and an enchanting smile and enticing lips, that didn’t necessarily mean anything.

“How much time do I have?” he asked quietly.

“It’s difficult to say.” Nyanko-sensei drained the last of the sake. “It got you to kiss it in four visits. And there’s no telling how much it stole from you before I knocked you apart.”

“Guess.”

Nyanko-sensei scowled. “Sometimes kitsune like to toy with meals for years. This one doesn’t strike me as the patient sort.”

“Sensei,” Natsume began, a little desperate.

“Can you ask Natori-san for the weekend off?”

Natsume blinked. “Today’s Friday. We have an exorcism planned over in—”

“Yes or no?”

“I…couldn’t I just call?”

“You’d confess over the phone? I thought you were more romantic than that.”

“Is that really—” Natsume wiped his brow. “—there’s really no other way?”

“Why is this even a problem? You have the perfect excuse to lay your heart out in front of your—”

“My what?” Natsume snapped. The ache was burning in his chest. Who knew tears could run so hot? “My high-school friend? And what do I say? Please ruin your life with me?” He flung out his arm. “Join me in my paradise, constantly on guard from every yokai who wants a favor, the Book of Friends, or a human soul?”

“You make it sound like he hasn’t already done that!” Nyanko-sensei’s hackles were up. “Three years of high school, he stayed with you, protected you, cared for you! What other human knows better what your life is?”

The fight left Natsume in a rush. “And he moved away. He was tired of it.” The tatami mats on his floor swam in his watery vision. “I couldn’t ask him to come back.”

“He told you that?” Nyanko-sensei sounded surprised.

“Well, why else would he leave?” Natsume demanded, hurt.

Nyanko-sensei stared at him. The moment dragged, and the emptiness in Natsume’s chest chanted with glee. _You’re right, he knows you’re right. You’re going to die alone, eaten up by heartache because who in their right mind would want your life? You were right to let Tanuma go without a fight. Let him live in blissful ignorance of your feelings, you should never—_

“Where’s your phone?” Nyanko-sensei’s voice was flat.

“Uh?”

“Your phone,” he hissed. “You are going to dial Natori-san’s number, and I am going to tell him you get the weekend off.”

“I don’t think you can grant me a weekend off, sensei.”

“You get the weekend off and you’re going to Tokyo, and then you are going to Tanuma Kanume’s apartment or his classroom or his part-time job or _wherever he is_ and confess.”

Natsume scoffed. “Really, sensei.”

“The kitsune magic is trying to make sure you don’t.” Nyanko-sensei looked as grim as a fat lucky cat could manage. “Your judgment is impaired.”

Natsume gritted his teeth. “I want a second opinion,” he said. “I’m not going to ruin Tanuma’s life just because you’re paranoid.”

“Paranoid! You little brat, I’ll show you paranoid—!”

* * *

 

Natori was no help at all. If anything, he helped throw Natsume under an oncoming bus, Destination: Love.

“I’m so glad you’re finally moving forward with Tanuma-kun,” his employer gushed over the phone. “Of course, it’s a pity it took a kitsune attack to motivate you, but it’s happening, and that’s the important thing.”

“I’ll be back tomorrow night,” Natsume said, scowling at Nyanko-sensei. “If the exorcism could wait until then—”

“What nonsense! Stay the weekend! I don’t want to see your face till Monday.”

Natsume’s skin burned. “I’m not staying in Tokyo.”

“You’re planning on confessing undying love and then leaving? Natsume-kun. Your approach lacks style.”

Natsume inhaled deeply. “I am _planning_ on telling Tanuma that a kitsune impersonated him. I will add that I have a…deep affection for him, and that the kitsune’s demand was that I let him know.” If Natsume played his cards right, he could satisfy the requirement of a “confession” and still keep Tanuma as a friend who understood that this sort of weirdness just happened from time to time.

The silence over the phone lasted for several seconds. Finally, “Is Madara there? May I?”

Listening to half a conversation was frustrating, especially when it was entirely about you. Natsume glared at Nyanko-sensei’s back.

“Yes. Yes, that’s really what he thinks. No. Well, he’ll find out soon enough, don’t you think? Oi! I would if I thought it would do any good, but you know what he’s like. You see my point. No, he’s a big boy. What?! _No one needs to teach him that!_ ” Nyanko-sensei ended the call with a violent flick of his paw and tossed the phone across the room.

“Hey!” Natsume scrambled for it. “Be careful, I can’t afford another one right now!”

Nyanko-sensei heaved a sigh and upended the sake bottle. It was empty.

* * *

 

Natsume stood outside the apartment building and double-checked the address on his phone. He knew it was the right place. He’d had the address memorized a week before Tanuma had even moved. Something ruffled his hair, and out of habit he looked up. Lesser yokai were all around in this heavily populated area, but it really had just been the warm night air sweeping by. Streetlights were winking on throughout the quaint neighborhood. Neon lights began buzzing, letting passersby know where to find hot fried food and icy cold beer.

His bag was too heavy on his shoulder. Nyanko-sensei had overseen his haphazard packing, and Natsume was fairly certain he’d tossed in some extra things when his back was turned. He straightened his spine and pressed the buzzer next to Tanuma’s name by the front door. If his fingers shifted a little and feathered over the familiar characters, no one saw.

“…Natsume?”

His breath left him in a rush. “Not even a hello?” he teased. Maybe the static of the intercom would cover the uneven tone of his voice.

Laughter filtered through the speaker, and Natsume closed his eyes to bathe in the sound. “I’ll be right down!” Tanuma called, and the static evaporated.

And then he was at the door, towering over Natsume as he always did, and _how_ had Natsume thought he could be nonchalant about this? Tanuma’s hair was in his face as usual, his clothes were unstylish as usual, his skin was perfect, his eyes tender, his smile welcoming, as usual, and Natsume’s heart burst in his chest.

“Natsume?” Tanuma said his name softly, brushed a thumb over his cheek. Natsume gasped at the feeling of tears being wiped away.“Are you all right?”

The yokai impersonator had nothing on the real thing. Natsume stumbled forward, aching to fill the emptiness inside. Lean arms wrapped around him instantly, and Natsume filled his senses with Tanuma. The scent of his shirt, the solidness of his shoulders, the warmth of his neck. When Tanuma stroked his back with hesitant hands, Natsume couldn’t be blamed for sighing.

“Rough trip?” Tanuma asked quietly. “Should we go inside? Are you hungry?”

Natsume wanted to stay right where he was, thanks, especially if going inside meant letting go. He tightened his hold.

Tanuma laughed, a sweetly confused sound. He slid an arm around Natsume’s shoulders and tucked him inside the door. “I’m just one flight up.” Natsume barely noticed when Tanuma took his bag from him. The apartment was spare and simple, like its owner. It smelled a bit of cleaning supplies and incense. Natsume felt a pang of guilt at the thought of Tanuma rushing around to get ready for a guest on short notice.

“Here, let me set your bag in the—”

But Natsume clutched his arm when Tanuma tried to move farther into the small apartment.

“Hey…” Tanuma glanced from him to the door behind them. His jaw set. “Is there something outside? Did you see something?”

“No. Well. Not here,” Natsume admitted slowly.

“Oh my god.” Tanuma pulled him into a tight hug. Natsume closed his eyes in bliss. “I knew something happened. You just texted out of the blue, and I knew something was wrong. What is it?”

Nothing was wrong. Everything was heaven, and Natsume felt none of the terrible ache the yokai had hollowed out in his chest last night. He was filled as long as Tanuma kept holding him.

“Look.” Tanuma sounded exasperated. “Are you…under some kind of spell? A curse? I’ll call Natori-san if you can’t tell me.”

Natsume’s eyes flew open. He jerked back, hands still clutching Tanuma’s sleeves. “No! No, I’m all right. Well, I’m _technically_ maybe not all right, but for now—”

“Natsume!” Tanuma shook him.

“I kissed a kitsune and it’s going to drain my soul if I don’t tell you—um. If I don’t…well.” Natsume faltered, the flood of words strangling his throat. He couldn’t go that far. He’d have to find some other way, Tanuma didn’t need this.

“You kissed…who?” Tanuma asked. He stepped back, but Natsume held on.

“It was an accident,” he insisted. “It was a yokai. It looked like…and now I have to come see you and tell you…” _Fuck._ This was much harder than it had any right to be. Natsume looked at the ceiling. The damn kitsune couldn’t have just wanted the Book of Friends like everyone else?

“You kissed a yokai,” Tanuma said carefully. “And for some reason, you had to come here and tell me about it.”

“Yes, okay, I know how it sounds.” Natsume laughed nervously.

“I doubt it.” Tanuma crossed his arms, and Natsume’s hands fell from him. “Do you need my help with something, Natsume-san, or are you bragging?” He smiled, but it held no humor.

“Bragging?” Natsume choked. “I was _attacked_.”

“You said you kissed it.”

“I didn’t mean to! It looked like you!”

“…what?”

 _Oh. Shit._ Natsume stared at him helplessly. “I mean…” he tried.

“You didn’t mean to kiss it…because it looked like me?” Tanuma’s face was a tangle of emotions Natsume couldn’t read.

“I—!” Natsume slapped a hand over his eyes. “Can we sit down? I’m pretty sure Nyanko-sensei threw a bottle of sake in my bag.”

After several awkward minutes, they were seated at a low folding table with a half-empty box of rice crackers and two mismatched sake cups. Natsume drained his first drink in a single shot. Eyebrow raised, Tanuma poured him another.

“About two weeks ago, I saw you in the grocery store,” Natsume began. If he kept his eyes on the cup in front of him, maybe he could do this. He ached, being this close to Tanuma and not touching him. If he looked at him, he’d tell him more than he wanted to. “And a week later, I saw you in the library, and then at the pub.”

Tanuma’s fingers twitched at the edge of Natsume’s vision. “I see. Did I say anything to you?”

“No.” Natsume squeezed his eyes shut. “I wonder if that’s where I messed up. I spoke to you when I saw you…in my bathtub.” Tanuma choked, and Natsume looked up quickly. “It! I saw _it_ and I spoke to it!”

The tips of Tanuma’s ears were red, peeking through his long dark hair. Natsume swallowed a whimper. “He got into your place?” Tanuma’s voice was hoarse. “How?”

“Kitsune are as powerful as Nyanko-sensei. He says. And trickier. His barriers weren’t enough.”

Questions shouted from Tanuma’s eyes. His knuckles were white around his cup. This wasn’t getting easier.

“And. Well. I was surprised to see you— _it_ —there. So I said your name. Just your name.”

Tanuma’s breath left him in a rush. Natsume was helpless to look away.

“And you touched me. And I kissed you.” Something about what he was saying was wrong, Natsume knew it, but the pink fog was back and spreading low in his mind. It whispered that, yes, he was saying it right. This was what had happened. “I kissed you, and you let me. You put your hands in my hair, and you kissed me back.”

“Natsume…” His name was a breath on Tanuma’s tongue.

“It was beautiful,” Natsume promised. He stood and walked around the small table. Tanuma was watching him with those dark eyes. Natsume wanted his eyes on him forever. “I’d wanted to kiss you for so long.” He knelt next to him. Lifted a hand to his jaw. “It hurt, but I never wanted it to stop.” He leaned forward.

Tanuma put a hand to his chest, and sharp light seemed to pierce the pink fog. “It hurt?” he whispered.

 _Oh no._ Oh no, what had he been thinking? Natsume got to one knee and tried to shove himself away. “I’m sorry—!”

Two slender hands reached for him, landing softly on his arm, his neck. “I don’t want it to hurt,” Tanuma said. “It wouldn’t hurt if it was us.”

“I…Tanuma?” There was so much Natsume didn’t know about the kitsune’s magic. Had he spread it to Tanuma accidentally? The thought of Tanuma reaching for him under a spell was enough to break Natsume’s heart.

“I won’t lose to some pranking yokai,” Tanuma said, eyes intense, cheeks flushed. “If you want to kiss me, then fucking kiss _me_ , Natsume Takashi.” He pushed himself up from the floor just enough to meet Natsume’s open mouth with his.

The rest of the pink fog evaporated, burned away by the brilliant white light that was Tanuma’s lips underneath his. Natsume’s hands settled on Tanuma’s neck, arched for the kiss, and Tanuma sighed at the caress. Nothing hurt. Natsume had thought it shouldn’t, when he’d let himself think about the kitsune’s kiss at all, but he couldn’t have imagined what would be in place of the hurt. It was glowing fire, it was spinning cherry blossoms, it was the taste in your mouth one second before eating a sweet.

Neither of them were practiced. It seemed they would have to figure out together how to move past clicking teeth and too much tongue. Natsume would have been delighted to study all night long, and he tried to say as much with every new touch. When his fingers explored just underneath the hem of Tanuma’s T-shirt, Tanuma gasped against their kiss.

“Let’s…let me…the futon,” he managed.

Natsume raised his head. When had they laid themselves out on the floor, feet tangled underneath the table? Only now could he feel the faint irritation on his elbows from the tatami mat. It was still such a minor thing in the face of the glow spreading through his body.

Tanuma’s eyes searched his. “I do have two. I borrowed an extra. So if you want…”

“Oh.” Natsume raked his gaze down to where Tanuma’s T-shirt was hiked to his waist, and then back up. “No?”

Tanuma beamed up at him. Pecked his lips with one last kiss, very chaste. “You take the bathroom first.”

Natsume tried to concentrate on his nightly routine, he really did. But the sound of Tanuma moving things around in the main room ensured that Natsume brushed his teeth twice because he couldn’t swear he’d done it once. It was early yet—should he insist they eat first? Perhaps they should talk about the kitsune’s demands more. Had Natsume been clear enough? Was there more to say? He leaned closer to the bathroom mirror and ran his fingers over his lips. They were redder than usual and a bit swollen. He shivered. Chapstick.

He opened a small zipper in the side of his bag. And promptly dropped the entire thing on the floor.

“Natsume? Everything all right?” Tanuma called.

“…Fine! Yeah!” He stared. Six condoms in two different sizes were scattered on the tile. He scooped them up. One was melon-flavored. “Sensei,” he hissed between his teeth. But he slipped one—nonflavored—into a pocket of the gym shorts he slept in. He rinsed the sink, flicked off the light, and slid the door back.

All but one lamp shone in the main room. The single futon seemed to glow white in the dimness. Tanuma looked up from fussing with a pillow. His throat moved a little, and he held out one hand. An image of a bathtub filled with magical water came to Natsume’s mind, but he shook back the memory. This was more. And real.

The condom didn’t get used that night. But they learned the shape of each other, and about favored touches and how they each sounded when the pleasure became too much. Though, Natsume knew he personally had never made noises like that before in his life. If Tanuma’s neighbors got no sleep, it was all Tanuma’s fault. Tanuma and his clever fingers and his warm hands and his sweet mouth.

In the wee hours of the morning, Tanuma pulled Natsume back with a firm hand in his hair, his breath slowing from that blissful race for a second time. “Did we ever…did you ever tell me…?” He inhaled deeply, and Natsume laughed fondly, crawling up his body to place a kiss on his neck. “ _Fuck_ , Natsume. Did you ever tell me what that yokai wanted? Is it gone now, do you think?”

Natsume stilled against Tanuma’s chest. “Nyanko-sensei said that it feasted on secret love.” There was no point in hiding. If the full weight of his heart was too much for Tanuma, so be it, but he couldn’t share a night like this with him and pretend anything less than everything he felt. He traced Tanuma’s collarbone. “I was a fool and made myself an easy target.”

Tanuma rested a hand over his. “And what did that mean for you? Exactly?”

Natsume gritted his back teeth. It felt shameful, admitting that tonight was caused by fear of a curse. But he pressed on. “I was either going to belong to the kitsune until…until my spirit was gone. Or I could—” He swallowed. “—confess that I belong to you.”

Tanuma was quiet for a long moment. “Are you going to make me ask which you decided?” he asked finally.

“Tanuma…” Natsume sighed into his neck. He trailed open-mouthed kisses along his jaw, the corner of his mouth, high on a cheekbone. “I’ve always belonged to you. I was never anything but yours. God, I’ve missed you.” The words fell from his throat in a flood, determined to be said. He couldn’t have shoved them back inside to please any yokai’s curse.

Tanuma’s smile was slow and sweet. He combed long fingers through Natsume’s hair, his eyes watching his own movements. “Then let me put my own barrier around you.” He looked up into Natsume’s eyes. “Be safe with me, my love.”

 

**Author's Note:**

> I haven't made it all the way through the anime, let alone the manga, so forgive me if anything isn't canon-compliant. Just enjoy the fluff ;)
> 
> [@codango](http://codango.tumblr.com/) on Tumblr  
> [Marcella Christie](http://marcellachristie.com/) for my alter ego


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